The Taoiseach, the British Prime Minister and the parties central to breaking the decommissioning impasse took part in several hours of intensive negotiations at Hillsborough Castle yesterday. The talks adjourned shortly before 10.30 p.m. and will resume at 9 a.m. today.
While the Ulster Unionist Party and Sinn Fein were holding to their fixed positions on decommissioning and the formation of an executive, both parties said they were searching for "room to manoeuvre".
Mr Tony Blair said it was still possible to reach agreement on the arms question. "It is difficult but it is do-able," Mr Blair's official spokesman said.
A Sinn Fein spokesman insisted that "we can't deliver IRA decommissioning". He added, however, that Sinn Fein was seeking to create some middle ground. "We are trying to find the space for each party to move into to make this work," he said. A senior UUP source acknowledged that it was probably unrealistic to expect any IRA decommissioning over the Easter period because of its historic 1916 significance. "We are sensitive to the timing," he added.
Late in the night Mr Blair and Mr Ahern held a series of meetings with Mr Gerry Adams and Mr Martin McGuinness of Sinn Fein, a senior UUP delegation led by Mr David Trimble, and Mr John Hume and Mr Seamus Mallon of the SDLP. At about 7 p.m. Mr Trimble left Hillsborough Castle to brief UUP Assembly members in a nearby hotel. He returned after about 30 minutes.
Both government leaders laid out possible means of bridging the differences between the UUP and Sinn Fein over decommissioning and the creation of an executive. There was speculation at one stage that the two parties could sign up to a deal where Sinn Fein would be accepted into the shadow executive on the proviso that the IRA would hand over some weapons or explosives in the following weeks.
Despite the persistent talk of a compromise, both Sinn Fein and the UUP were insistent during the evening that such a deal was out of the question and never on the table.
"Rubbish, rubbish," said a Sinn Fein spokesman. A UUP spokesman said there was absolutely no basis for such speculation.
Mr McGuinness met Mr Ahern and Mr Blair for more than two hours in the first of yesterday's series of meetings. Initially that meeting had been due to last an hour. Mr McLaughlin described these talks as "very positive". The North's Deputy First Minister, Mr Mallon, said that while no concrete proposals to break the logjam had emerged, the principal disputing parties were "getting near the stage where hardball will be played ".
Mr Mallon reaffirmed the SDLP position that it would act as guarantor to ensure that by May 2000, the deadline indicated in the Belfast Agreement, there would be IRA decommissioning. He had stated that the SDLP would seek the expulsion of Sinn Fein from any executive if decommissioning was not in place until then.
As the talks progressed, both the Ulster Unionist Party and Sinn Fein were holding to their respective positions. A UUP spokesman said any move by the Northern Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlan, to trigger the d'Hondt mechanism to set up the executive, in the absence of some disarmament, would be immediately met by motions in the Assembly seeking the exclusion of Sinn Fein from the executive.
Dr Mowlam had indicated that she would trigger d'Hondt either today or tomorrow, but it was suggested last night that because of the sensitive stage of the negotiations, she would refrain from such a move.
